The evolution of snoo

When Alby was born Mark and I recorded his every living minute in hope of seeing patterns in his behaviour.   Whilst sleeping through still eludes him he has always been very good at having two naps every day in addition to a good ten hours through the night (albeit with the occasional feed).  From day one until about a month ago his typical routine demanded a morning nap exactly two hours after waking up in the morning plus a mid-afternoon nap, usually an hour after lunch.

As Alby grows however, his morning nap isn’t needed with quite the same urgency as before and he can now go a good hour or more longer before wanting to crash out.  Indeed, why would one want to sleep when one can charge around the house making mischief and bashing into things?  The problem is that Alby is wanting his morning nap at almost exactly the time that I need to bundle him up and send him off to nursery. And no matter how tired he is when he gets to nursery he is always so distracted by the other children, toys, books and activities that he just fights sleep until the point of no return – which recently has happened both mid-nappy change and mid-lunch. 

Knowing how precious sleep is for babies (and yes adults too, but we’ll get to me another day) this has naturally concerned me.   Books talk about the importance of sleep for physical development, but I see the emotional side; the little boy in need of lots of cuddles and comfort feeds because he doesn’t know what to do with himself.  And whilst I love the cuddles and connection we have, I’d rather they come from a bright eyed Trouble Monkey than a Zombie with dwarfism.

And so yesterday, when Alby fell asleep during the ten minute car journey from Buggy Fit back to the base, I decided to let him sleep.  We could leave nursery for a little bit, and he could snoo contentedly in his car seat for as long as he wanted (which turned out to be 45 minutes).

Now before you start calling social services on me I did not abandon him in the car for 45 minutes.  Nope, not me.  With my work day about to start I went into the house, got a drink, my laptop and my phone and went back to the car.  I pushed the driver’s seat back and got on with answering emails. 

Not quite the image I had of myself as the “work at home mother” but I’ll take it.

Today when we did a similar mad dash back home from swimming and the same thing happened I tried out a new idea – I managed to gently move Alby from car seat to buggy without waking, covered him in blankets and delivered to nursery a well padded angel-boy. 

With his morning naps taking place later in the day his afternoon naps have also shifted.  But I’ve already got that covered.  The darker nights mean that Percy’s evening walk is now happening at 4pm, just in time for Alby’s afternoon snoo. 

Of course the success of the afternoon sleep depends largely on the success of the morning nap, but if today and yesterday prove to be more than just fluke, then I will feel as though I’ve won the jackpot.